


Future Past

by LittleCaity



Series: Smith and Jovanka [2]
Category: Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005), Sarah Jane Adventures
Genre: Angst, Gen, The Boys are oblivious, The Doctor Sometimes Doesn't Think
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-25
Updated: 2013-01-25
Packaged: 2017-11-26 20:42:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/654219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleCaity/pseuds/LittleCaity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rory looks at the boy and wonders if he’s seeing the Doctor’s past or the future lying in wait for Amy and for himself. </p>
<p>(Set just after The Power of Three and just before The Angels Take Manhattan for the TARDIS crew.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Future Past

**.oOo.**

The phone was battered and slightly burned, and Rory Pond would happily have sworn under oath that it hadn’t been anywhere in the console room before it suddenly lit up and started playing Bohemian Rhapsody at the top of its tinny little speakers.

There was something actually kind of creepy about the phone, and when Amy grabbed it and threw it at him with a disturbed expression he almost dropped it completely before managing a fumbling save. The Doctor glared up at him from beneath the console, grabbing another bizarre tool from his bag. 

“Oi, Ponds! Someone answer that!”

“Fine, I’ve got it.” Rory peered at the scorched keypad and found what looked like the right button, pressing it and holding the damaged mobile up to his ear. “Ah, hello?”

Amy mouthed ‘just hello?’ at him and he shrugged. This situation was weird enough as it was, what else was he supposed to say?

It said a lot about travelling with the Doctor that even an unexpected phone call could be downright strange.

“Hello. This is Sarah Jane Smith; are you the Doctor or a companion?” The woman’s voice was warm and held a note of amusement in it; he found himself smiling without thinking about it. There was a faint hum along the line, though, like the humming of the TARDIS’s engines but far more subdued.

“A companion,” he told the voice, shrugging back at Amy with a smile. “Rory Pond. I’m afraid the Doctor is buried inside the console right now.”

“Typical. Rory, could you tell the Doctor it’s Sarah Jane calling about Adric?”

“Alright.” He held the phone away from his ear and poked his head under the console. “Doctor, it’s someone called Sarah Jane Smith.”

“Oh, and who’s Sarah Jane, then? Another girlfriend?” Amy laughed cheerfully, leaning back against the railing.

“She says she’s calling about Adric.”

Rory and Amy winced in unison as the Doctor tried to sit up suddenly and the resulting impact echoed through the console room. Several more painful thumps accompanied his frantic scrambling before he practically lunged at Rory, snatching the phone from his hands and holding onto it so tightly that the plastic creaked.

“Sarah Jane,” the Doctor all but gasped down the phone, and Rory took Amy’s hand. He’d never seen that look on the Time Lord’s face before, scared and hopeful and desperate all at once. _Vulnerable_. “Sarah Jane, who told you about Adric?”

A few seconds later the Doctor whooped and flung himself at the console, actively embracing it for several long moments before flipping switches like a man possessed.

“Doctor, who are Sarah Jane and Adric?” Amy asked, folding her arms. “I swear, if this turns out to be an ex or something...”

“No time!” He flipped a switch, and the TARDIS lurched alarmingly. “Hold on, Ponds! Next stop, Bannerman Road!”

**.oOo.**

“Doctor, this isn’t Bannerman Road. This is a school.” Amy rolled her eyes and accepted the coat Rory passed her. “And it’s raining.”

The Doctor didn’t even seem to hear her, the TARDIS doors opening unusually quickly. It almost felt like she was picking up on the Doctor’s unusual mood. Usually that intense focus only came out when faced with some kind of horrible threat, but his expression was too soft for that.

It was almost wistful, now that he thought about it. “Come on. We’d better find out what all this is about. It should be interesting.”

“I still maintain this Sarah Jane is a former girlfriend,” Amy huffed, zipping up the coat. “I’m not sure about Adric though. Former boyfriend, maybe?”

“Okay, no more soaps for you.” He gallantly held out his arm. “Shall we, Mrs. Pond?”

“We shall, Mr. Pond.” She linked her arm around his and they stepped out into the miserable drizzle. Definitely England, then. The Doctor already had a reasonable lead on them, and he started to run even as they set out after him.

By the time they reached the main road, they were flat out sprinting and the Doctor seemed to still be picking up speed.

**.oOo.**

Bannerman Road turned out to be a fairly normal seeming suburban street, a double string of nice houses with pleasant little gardens. If the Doctor hadn’t run up to the door of Number 13 and started hammering quite frantically, there wouldn’t have been anything to indicate that it wasn’t just any other road in Ealing.

It was a beautiful old house, tall and surrounded by a lovely garden. The kind of home he still hoped to give Amy someday, a place to live and be happy and to raise children. He could hear a few voices from inside the house, the words indistinct but the tones enough to tell him that the people inside were happy and joking.

“Sarah Jane!” the Doctor yelled, hammering again until the door shook. Finally the door opened, revealing a teenager with soft brown hair and wide, guileless eyes, dressed in a neat school uniform complete with jumper and tie. “Hello Luke my boy! You’re looking well, you’ve gained an inch or two since the Crucible.”

“...Doctor?” The boy tilted his head and looked him up and down slowly. “Mum’s going to have a fit. You’re late.”

“I am _never_ late.” Amy scoffed behind him, crossing her arms. “Oh, right, Ponds. Amy, Rory, this is Luke Smith. Luke, the Ponds. Don’t let Rory make you tea, he’s terrible at it. Where is he?”

“Upstairs, but I think you should wait for-” The Doctor pushed past Luke before he was finished, not hard but with a single-mindedness that usually meant Very Bad Things. “Doctor, wait!”

“You have actually met him, right?” Rory asked Luke as the Doctor broke into a run. “Come on, in this mood he might break something.”

“When does he ever _not_ break things?” Amy shot back, although she was smiling. “I can’t wait to see what this little episode is about.”

They jogged up the stairs behind the Doctor, and Rory couldn’t help but notice the look on Luke’s face. It was fear and worry and curiosity all tangled together. He recognised it easily. It was an expression he’d worn quite frequently during his first days in the TARDIS, especially when Amy was running headfirst into something completely mad.

He most assuredly does not think of strange girls who don’t show up in the mirror or of seeing his own hand fold open.

They burst into the attic in a barely controlled rush, startling the group already there. He was fairly certain that the short older woman with the fierce eyes and red-glowing lipstick in her hand was Sarah Jane. He had no idea who the teenagers in the same uniform as Luke were, but from the way the Doctor suddenly stopped and stared at the trio with an expression of pure hope, one of them had to be the Adric whose name had been the catalyst for this little trip.

“Is he wearing a bow tie?” the oldest-looking teen with short hair asked, his expression utterly incredulous. “It’s not 1920 any more, man.”

“Bow ties are cool,” the Doctor said, and the girl giggled, half amused and half nervous.

The boy with the pale skin and dark, dark hair narrowed his eyes and stepped back towards the... was that a computer? That was definitely not like any kind of computer he’d seen before. “Who are you?” the boy asked, his voice trembling a little. It was definitely him the Doctor was looking at, the hope on his face slowly turning into something pleased and just a touch shocked. 

“Luke?” the woman asked, and Rory knew for sure that she was the Sarah Jane he’d spoken to on the half-ruined mobile. She held her hand out and Luke ran over, letting himself be pulled into a protective hug.

“It’s him,” Luke said, staring over with wide eyes. “It’s the Doctor.”

The dark-haired boy staggered, looking so young as the Doctor grabbed him and pulled him into a crushingly tight hold that made Luke’s eyes spark dangerously and the girl clap a hand over her mouth to muffle a squeal.

“Adric,” the Doctor said, soft and gentle, resting his head on top of the boy’s hair and taking a deep breath that audibly shook. “Adric, I’m so sorry...”

The boy, Adric, raised his hands and clung to the Doctor’s jacket tight enough for his knuckles to go white, and Rory looked away, suddenly struck by how intimate a moment this was. Whoever this Adric was, news of his mere existence was enough to send the Doctor racing across time and space with the manic intent of a bloodhound on a scent, and it felt wrong to watch their reunion.

He met Sarah Jane’s eyes, and she nodded. “I’ll make some tea,” she said, shepherding the teens out of the attic, and Rory nudged Amy into following. Even once they were all set up in the kitchen, Luke kept glancing upwards, as if he could see right through to the Doctor and Adric.

“He’s changed again,” Sarah Jane eventually said, setting down a tray full of cups and a plate of biscuits, returning to the table a moment later with a large pot of tea. “Every time I get used to him having a new face... Sorry, who are you again?”

“I’m Amy Pond,” Amy said, shaking Sarah Jane’s hand firmly. “And this is my husband, Rory. We travel with the Doctor.”

“You’re married?” The expression on Sarah Jane’s face was equal parts amused and impressed as she sat down next to Luke, squeezing his shoulders briefly. “That _is_ new, he wasn’t overly keen on couples when I was travelling with him. Oh, sorry. This my son, Luke, and our friends Clyde Langer and Maria Jackson.”

“I told you she was an ex,” Amy said, grinning. “You know what that means.”

“Not in front of the kids!” Rory could feel his cheeks heating up with embarrassment. Clyde leaned back in his chair and wolf-whistled, ducking under a gentle smack from Maria only to put himself in the path of Sarah Jane’s slap upside the head.

“Hey, they started it!” Clyde protested, rubbing the back of his head. “So, that’s the Doctor? He doesn’t look like much.”

“Neither do you, and you do alright for yourself,” Maria said, giggling at his pout. “Come on, you couldn’t possibly expect me to let that one pass.”

“You’re as bad as your dad, you are.”

“So, how does Adric know the Doctor?” Amy asked, glancing upstairs herself. “Or should that be the other way around? I’ve seen him in some pretty worked up states, but this... This is something new.”

“What has he told you about his former Companions?” Sarah Jane asked, looking the both of them in the eyes. Her eyes were so intense, filled with the knowledge of everything that was out there and everything buried here on Earth too, that he had to look away.

“Some leave,” he said, softly, but the tone in his voice managed to cut through everything. “Some are left behind. And some die.”

(He dreams of death and living as a fake, waiting for an eternity for his Amy to come back to him.)

“My friend Tegan left. He left me behind.” Luke squeezed Sarah Jane’s arm, and she smiled wanly at him. “Adric died, or so he thought. So everyone thought, until recently. The TARDIS worked something out, and I have a supercomputer and a robot dog. He was here almost before we knew it.”

“You know, before I met the Doctor, that would have been weird.” Rory smiled, pushing the half-formed memories away as hard as he could. 

“I’m just surprised he managed to find the right year, honestly,” Sarah Jane said, her smile getting a little wider and more genuine. “When he dropped me off, he was aiming for South Croyden in 1980 and he ended up leaving me in Aberdeen in 1979! The Brigadier almost had kittens.”

“You didn’t mention _that_ part last time!” The Doctor sauntered in, looking as cheerful as ever, but there was an extra little bounce in his step and light in his eyes that hadn’t been there before. Adric trailed behind him, but quickly darted over to sit next to Luke and nurse a pensive expression. “Pity, I would have liked to see that. Was Benton doing that little ‘not smiling’ act he always did when he was trying not to laugh?”

“Of course. They’re both retired now, of course, but I talk to them fairly often.” 

Soon everyone was settled and the impromptu tea party carried on for quite some time, until it got dark outside and Maria’s father arrived to take her home and to send Clyde back to his own house. Not before Clyde had extracted a promise from the Doctor to show him something ‘alien and cool and _not_ gun-mad’ when he was a bit older, though.

**.oOo.**

Eventually Sarah Jane glanced at her watch and let out a high-pitched noise, pushing herself away from the table and shaking Luke and Adric out of a near doze that had them leaning on each other heavily. Rory checked the clock on the wall and winced a little himself; they had managed to talk so long into the night that it was really morning.

“Come on, boys, time to go to bed,” Sarah Jane all but crooned, smiling down on the boys with a warm expression that made Rory’s heart clench, just a little. They couldn’t give up the Doctor, not yet, but a very large part of him wanted to have that someday.

The Doctor suddenly slung an arm around Adric’s shoulders, and the boy jumped and looked up at the Time Lord with wide eyes. He knew, suddenly and clearly, what the Doctor was going to do. He wouldn’t ask – the Doctor never asked, not exactly – but he was going to bring Adric back into the TARDIS.

Part of him was terribly curious to see what would happen, but the look on the boy’s face had most of him thinking that this wouldn’t end well at all. He could see Amy thinking the same thing, and he squeezed her hand gently.

“You’ll love the new console room,” the Doctor said, grinning the slightly manic grin he always had when he was about to show off the TARDIS. “And I bet you still remember how to fly her, too! She’ll be glad to have you back.”

“Doctor, you can’t!” Luke burst out, making to stand but restrained by the firm press of Sarah Jane’s hands on his shoulders. “Mum!”

Adric slithered out from under the Doctor’s arm and stepped back. He looked over at Amy and Rory, meeting their eyes for the first time. The boy had such dark eyes, and they were so easy to read. Pain and sorrow and a gnawing despair shadowed them, making him look older than he was.

“No.” He moved back even further, to the circle of Sarah Jane and Luke’s arms. “I’m not going. I don’t want to!”

“Adric?” The Doctor went after him, reaching out, but his hand stopped just shy of touching the boy. “I don’t understand.”

“I like it here!” Adric’s hand laced tightly around Luke’s, their fingers twining around each other until they went white and red from the pressure. “I don’t want to leave!”

_Oh_.

He looked over at Amy, thankful once more for the easy ability she had to read him like a book when he saw the realisation on her face mirroring his own. The simple fact was that the Doctor listened to her far more readily than he ever did Rory, although he was at least improving on that front.

“Doctor,” she said, resting a hand gently on his arm and easing it back down. “Not this time.”

“But you wanted to keep travelling with me...” The Doctor looked lost, slipping his arm free of Amy’s touch to stroke gently at Adric’s hair. It wasn’t every day that someone came back from the dead, even for the Doctor, so he couldn’t blame him for being overwhelmed, even irrational. “I thought you were going to stay...”

“People change. You know that better than anyone.” The Doctor’s hand fell of it’s own accord, and the Time Lord just... slumped, just a little. Resigned himself to losing the battle. “I have a family here. I’ve never had a real family before.”

“Oh.” The Doctor straightened, smiled a smile that was only a tiny bit forced. “Well, just remember that you can always change your mind. I’m sure Mister Smith can find me again.”

“Knowing you, you’ll be back before long.” Sarah Jane’s smile was genuine, or so it seemed, but there was something sharp in there too. “You always turn up at the strangest moments.”

“The TARDIS takes me to where I’m needed.”

“That’s a change.” Despite the snarkiness, Sarah Jane carefully detached herself from the boys and hugged the Doctor. “Try not to bring Daleks next time?”

“Oi, I never bring Daleks!” He pouted dramatically as he hugged Sarah Jane, pausing before sweeping forwards and hugging Luke and Adric in the same hold. “I... Take care of each other.”

“Goodbye, Doctor.” Adric’s smile was sad, and Luke looked like he was decidedly ambivalent about the whole situation.

Rory had never seen the Doctor quite so sad as when they left Bannerman Road behind.

**.oOo.**

The Doctor stared at the console for a long time once they left Ealing, something small and broken held tightly in one hand. Amy had tried to ask about Adric, but had been met with uncharacteristic silence.

“They have such a crush on each other,” he suddenly piped up, determined to snap the Doctor out of his funk. “Did you see the way Luke _glared_ every time the Doctor touched Adric?”

“And they’ll make such a cute couple, too!” Amy said, warming to the subject and somehow managing to suppress a giggle when the Doctor’s head shot up. “When they work out what they want, anyway.”

“Oh, to be a teenager and in love.” Rory snickered despite himself, wrapping an arm around Amy’s waist. “Sneaking off every chance we got...”

“Couple?” The Doctor lunged at one of the screens, yanking it down and hitting buttons on the console so fast his hands were a blur. A picture of the two boys appeared on the screen, a couple of years older and dressed in the same uniforms, accompanied by an article. He homed in on the caption and suddenly started laughing.

“Luke Smith and Adric Jovanka at the scene of their lucky escape,” Amy read over his shoulder, but the rest of it was drowned out as the Doctor clung to the edge of the console and almost howled with laughter that shook his entire body.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes. This DOES mean that Adric wound up taking Tegan's last name.


End file.
